Standardized Test Items:



Formative Assessment Probe:
Mindy Bailey
Batteries, Bulbs, and Wires. Volume 3 page 57-62.
The purpose of this assessment probe is to elicit students' ideas about complete circuits involving light bulbs. The probe reveals whether students recognize the pathway of electricity in a complete circuit, including its path through a light bulb, in order to light a bulb using only one strip of wire and a battery.


FACTs:
Mindy Bailey
  1. Interest Scale. The students place a sticky note on a chart to make a scale of low to high to indicate their interest level on the subject. I would use this as an introduction to see how interested the students are in electricity because the interest plays a big role in the learning and the students who are more interested will want to learn more about the subject.
  2. I Used To Think...but Now I Know. This assessment allows students to write down their ideas about the idea before the lesson and after the lesson. I would use this to make sure the students are understanding what is being taught and what they learned about electricity before class and after class. I would have them make a chart of I used to think and now i know and list what they learned.

Jessica Harper
  1. K-W-L Variations. Students describe what they Know about a topic, Want to know about a topic, and what they Learned about the topic. I would use this at the beginning of the lesson to find out what students know about electricity and what they want to know. I would use what they write to try to explain as much as they want to know in my lesson then after the lesson I would have them fill in what they learned and hopefully they will be able to answer the question of what they want to know.
  2. Annotated Student Drawings. These are student made labeled illustrations that visually represent and describe students' thinking about the concept. I would use this FACT to teach electricity by having students draw how they think it will work before we start and at the end they will make another labeled drawing of how it is correctly used.

Tina Gibson
  1. Give Me Five: After an activity students are given quiet time to reflect on the activity and then teacher allows five students to volunteer to publicly share their reflection. I think this would be a great tool to use while teaching electricity. Students would be able to tell what made the light bulb light up and what did not.
  2. Traffic Light Cups: Red, yellow, and green cups are given to each group. Students use cups to tell teacher if they need assistance or not. Red meaning they do need assistance and green meaning they do not. I think this would be great to use when building circuits because it would be easy for the teacher to know which groups need help and which do not.